Call the Midwife 2.

[Toddlerteaplease]

First time I've ever had a thread that filled up!
@PaperwhiteTheGhost Can't believe I forgot AG, it's my most hated hymn ever!

So glad that S JM was able to speak at the wedding. She had me worried in the previous episode.

Really wished Chummy and Peter and Jenny were able to come. I miss them so much. And Cynthia too. I know in the book Farewell To The East End she got married and recovered from her depression eventually.

One of many favourite SMJ moments! Best.nun.ever.

I got pregnant at 15 in year 11. My parents forced me to have an abortion at a private hospital miles from the town we lived in so I and they wouldn't be recognised. I then had a week off school and my parents said I had an asthma attack . This was 1993, I remember crying and begging the hospital porters and nurse not to make me go through with it and let me keep my baby as they wheeled me to surgery but they said they had no choice as my parents decision was final. I will never forget the look of pity on the nurses face as they held me down to put me to sleep. 30 years on I still feel guilty I didn't fight harder to keep my baby.

It wasn't your fault. I'm so sorry you went through this. I hope you have someone to talk to about all this. 💐

@FlyingCapybara40 thank you I still feel guilty sometimes, I had a miscarriage in 2004 and was convinced it was my punishment that was when I had some counselling. I now have a 17 and 14 year old and often wonder what life would be like with a 29 year old too! The same happened to someone I know in 2012 and she was sent up north by her parents at 15 years old so I think the stigma was definitely still there amongst some people even then (she was from an upper class background not sure if that made a difference)

Sorry you went through that @2anddone. I had an abortion when I was 17. I felt totally alone in the world, I knew my parents would never support me and so I did what I thought was the only thing I could do. I went on my own and cried the whole time, before I was put to sleep I was silently hoping that would someone would stop what was going to happen. But they didn't. And I've regretted it every single day of my life.

The play ended around the time filming began for the Christmas special. So, no, that would have had no bearing on why she wasn't in the majority of the episodes this series.

Well I'm still on my re-watch and series 5 is most definitely when it went down hill.

Anyway Sister Evangelina has died (sob) so now they are being white colonialist saviours so naturally they are experiencing every emergency in one day. While the resident white colonialist savior doctor lectures them on poverty.

Though of course white colonialist saviour is in keeping with the time period.

I'm still hooked up on how big or small the district they served was. Does anyone know? I tried finding historical facts about Poplar but I am unsure what was part of the district.

I think they mentioned it on the first episode (or one of the first), unless I mix this up with the books.

I'm quite surprised by this news

https://www.dailymail.co.uk/tvshowbiz/article-12502567/Call-Midwife-cast-left-stunned-upset-fan-favourite-star-written-hit-BBC-show.html?ito=social-facebook&fbclid=IwAR2KGRcodtvLcIBii-rLEFuuOVP2UbGndhlA60KOYjA8rsk8N9kAOJZOHC0aemmAUH5ggb55B4K57qRVCI2Sqvl6ewWEPLa3xKSYUv6pXkeNvbKNbEd2uTkOv4WW0tw6g

I presume this is for the 2025 series as 2024 will have already been filmed. I didn't care for him personally but it's surprising given the recent events in the show. Maybe he will be an 'off camera' character like Chummy was.

I hope he will be an "off-camera" character. Go back to lawyering or something. They can't keep having him popping up to save the day as an excuse for having him appear in most episodes. That storyline wore thin several series ago!

Either hall be off screen or they really will have gone total shitty soap and Trixie will be the resident character who can never leave but can also never be happy for more than 1 episode at a time.

My first thought was... please don't kill him off!
I'm hoping for a baby for Trixie... maybe she will retire from midwifery but make regular appearances as a patron while bringing up their children?

Seems an odd decision. It's difficult to understand how they could make him an off-screen character given how prominent he's been and that presumably Trixie will be parenting his child.

And how will the convent manage without it's constant benefactor?

It does seem such an odd plot decision-just had trixie happily married and Matthew a reasonably central character and he's off?

Maybe trixie in a happy domestic set up would be boring? Chummy managed and happy life and stilll active but trixie such a central character.
And who will look after Baby Jonathan??

I just can not see what the point of it as it seems it was a CTM decision not an Ollie decision.

Think some of the departures have been managed so so badly-poor Lucille, and I can't even remember what happened to Val?
Do like Patsy and Delia having a happy life offscreen

It is an odd decision. I think it would be limiting for Trixie to have him as an off screen character.

Though he is a bit of a wooden top character in this. It will be interesting to see how they manage his exit.

I think he should just be very busy with work, off screen. Not seen, not heard. I reckon Dr Turner was threatened by having another man coming in and solving all the problems he hadn't got round to yet and so got his actual wife to remove the competition by writing him out.

That, or there was truth in the rumours about the actors leaving their real life relationships at the same time and now it's ended and is all a bit awkward at work?

As a more of a 1960s question rather than tv... now Trixie is Lady Aylward won't she be expected to give up work? Chummy was a policeman's wife, Barbara a vicars wife and Lucille an engineers wife so completely different situation for them. (Sheila works for her husband so a bit different too!)

I reckon Dr Turner was threatened by having another man coming in and solving all the problems he hadn't got round to yet and so got his actual wife to remove the competition by writing him out.

That, or there was truth in the rumours about the actors leaving their real life relationships at the same time and now it's ended and is all a bit awkward at work?

That sounds interesting but I can't find much about that other than Helen George's split from her husband.

Realistically you'd expect her, in her position, to have given up work back in the 1960s.

But Trixie's real life relationship was with Tom the vicar-not Matthew Aylward.

They have split recently but can't imagine that has anything to do with it.

Hmmmmmm

I was going to say exactly the same thing about Dr T being threatened by another man being so central! Dr T has to be saviour of the day, not Matthew…

Id be glad if they went back to it being about midwives / community nursing / health visitors even - and left the men in the sidelines. It was nice having a programme centred on professional women just doing their jobs well.

It was so clunky, the way he was written into every episode. Chummy’s policeman husband was easier to write because it was realistic that he’d be involved professionally with Nonnatus House and the community. Likewise the vicar, Fred the handyman, and Dr T.

In retrospect, they should have made Matthew a housing officer or a headmaster - something like that. And kept the role light-touch, because this is supposed to be a show about professional women and his saviour complex became vexing imo. No offence to Olly Rix.